Unit 3 Introduction to Tirukkural
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1 UNIT 3 INTRODUCTION TO TIRUKKURAL Contents 3.0 Objectives 3.1 Introduction 3.2 Philosophical Insights of Tirukkural 3.3 Moral Philosophy of Tiruvalluvar 3.4 Social Philosophy of Tiruvalluvar 3.5 Political Philosophy of Tiruvalluvar 3.6 Let us Sum up 3.7 Key Words 3.8 Further Readings and References 3.0 OBJECTIVES As objective scholars on Indian philosophy would vouche for a fact that Indian culture is not built upon only one tradition. Neither monopoly of one religious tradition within India nor of one linguistic tradition would be acceptable in the plurality of Indian traditions. Sources of Indian philosophy are spread about many religious, philosophical and moral treatises, both written and oral, in various ancient languages like Pali, Prakrit, Sanskrit and Tamil. Apart from the stereotyped treatment on dwelling only on Sanskrit tradition for Indian philosophical thoughts, this unit emphatically proclaims the deep philosophical insights embedded in classical Tamil text called Tirukkural. The objective of this unit is to bring out the moral, social and political philosophy of Tirukkural. The unit would mostly avoid the introductory details about the text and concentrate fully on its philosophical insights for want of space. Such a brief introduction on Tirukkural could be found in the unit on ancient Dalit thinkers in one of the elective courses of IGNOU MA philosophy under the title, Dalit philosophy. The numbers given within bracket in the sentences of this unit refer to the number of couplet of Tirukkural. 3.1 INTRODUCTION ‘Tirukkural’ etymologically means the ‘holy couplets,’ i.e. a text having two lines with seven words each in the Tamil poetic ‘venba’ metre. It has 1330 couplets with 133 chapters each containing 10 couplets. Tiruvalluvar did not write autobiography nor any authentic biographies are available there is no perfect life-sketch of Tiruvalluvar. A few information about his life are passed on orally. He lived at Mylapore, Chennai, engaged in weaving as his profession, married to a maid known as Vasuki. Certain events that are purported to have taken place in his life seem to be unbelievable. Tirukkural is a moral compendium which has been classified under three major headings; aram (righteousness), porul (wealth), ibam (enjoyment). The ideological implication of these titles is that one must earn wealth through righteous means and enjoyment becomes imminent through that which leads to enlightenment. This view is similar to the Sanskrit tradition of dharma, artha, kama and moksa. 2 3.2 PHILOSOPHICAL INSIGHTS OF TIRUKKURAL Tiruvalluvar’s philosophy is that of common man and hence he developed his ideals in such a manner that man ought to live as a true human being and cherish all the human values, promote earthly virtues, establish social harmony, engage in domestic life, follow political ideologies, develop mutual assistance, adhere to the life of renunciation, enjoy all kinds of pleasures, contemplate deeply on a few metaphysical issues etc. In the invocatory chapter known as ‘the Praise of God,’ Tiruvalluvar glorifies the significant features of God: He is the ancient Lord or the Supreme Being; Lord with perfect intelligence; Flower decked God; He who has transcended likes and dislikes; Iraivan – the protector of the universe; unparalleled Lord; the embodiment of righteousness; Lord endowed with Eight attributes; He who has annihilated the onslaught of the senses; the great controller of the living beings. Nowhere does the author mention the Lord with his specific name, probably to teach mankind about the relationship between God, human beings and the world. Had he mentioned the name of God, then people would think that the moral philosophy of Tiruvalluvar is based on the preachings of that particular religion whose God’s name has been mentioned. Since Tiruvalluvar wanted to establish a society where people belonging to all religious sects should lead a peaceful and harmonious life, he had explicated the need of monotheistic divinity. Still scholars taking into consideration few religious expressions found in the couplets proclaim that such expressions unequivocally indicate their God and therefore Tiruvalluvar belongs to their religious cult and his moral thought are pertaining to their religion. If Tiruvalluvar is confined to a particular religion, then the universalistic outlook of his moral ideologies would be misnomer. In the chapter on “The Dread of Beggary,’ he explaines: If the Supreme Lord who has created this world has destined that man should continue to live through begging, then let that Lord wander about the world and perish.”(1062). In this verse Tiruvalluvar links the life of penury and poverty leading to the act of begging and the person who is responsible for this degradation and curses Him to go away from this world. Thus Tiruvalluvar wants to behold that mankind should have a self-contained life. Tiruvalluvar has mentioned the fact that the universe has been created by God. Tiruvalluvar deliberately did not write anything about moksa or liberation. Probably, he might have thought that life on this earth is to be lived perfectly and honestly than contemplating upon life beyond death. According to the commentators, since moksa is concerned with a blissful state of experience, it cannot be explained in adequate terms. As such there are no authentic reports about the state of liberation, but many theoretical accounts are available through revelations of the mystic saints. Hence Tiruvalluvar might have thought that any one who is virtuous in his domestic, social, political and moral spheres, he will certainly experience abundant joy in every aspect of life, veedu peru. The kama or inbam (pleasure) described by Tiruvalluvar in the third section is to be understood in terms of leading to the everlasting and increasing bliss. At the worldly level we have physical pleasure and mental happiness, but at the spiritual plane, which is mystic in nature and essence, the rapture is to be experienced rather than explained. Hence 3 ,Tiruvalluvar wants every human being to concentrate on the life on earth than contemplating on a heavenly life. Another interesting feature of this famous text is that its author has not used anywhere the terms such as Tamil language, Tamilian, Tamil country, though all the 1330 couplets are in chaste Tamil language. There are totally 9310 Tamil words used in this work. In the first couplet itself Tiruvalluvar resorts to his intention of spreading his message for mankind: “The world of sound commences with the letter ‘A’. Similarly all that exists in the world commence from the Prime Mover.” In several places the author uses the expressions like ‘ulaku’ ‘ulakam’ ‘vaiyam’ ‘jnalam’ etc., to refer to the world. His love for mankind and fascination to find out man as living as a genuine human, without social discrimination, linguistic fanaticism, racial inequealities, political turmoils, religious fundamentalism, moral disturbances, mental imbalances, regional dissimilarities, national prejudices, economic upheavel, geographical divisions etc., are found in every couplet. He delves deeply on almost all the aspects of human life. At several places he indicates that man should not live through the senses which is nothing but the life of brutish beasts. He expects man to use his sixth sense viz., mind to sort out all human issues and lead a life of spirituality which will bring forth a life of tranquility and solace to all human woes. In preface to his translation of Tirukkural VVS Aiyar states, “Tiruvalluvar has given to the world a work to which, in perfection of form, profoundity of thought, nobleness of sentiment, and earnestness of moral purpose…” The last section of this grand work deals exclusively with the various aspects of domestic life especially the inner part of it known as conjugal love, He divides this section into two divisions, first speaks about pre-marital love and the second about married life. This shows that the ancient Tamils have developed grammar not only for the external life of human beings, but also for the internal living. 3.3 MORAL PHILOSOPHY OF TIRUVALLUVAR Very cleverly Tiruvalluvar refers to virtue in two different but similar terms, viz., aram and aran. The title of the chapter is emphasis on aran which means the glorification of righteousness. The subtle difference between these two terms is that aram means the definition of virtue. For instance, avoidance of jealously, greediness, wrath and abusive language is the best way to acquire aram (35). As contrast he reiterates that domestic life is exclusively that is practiced as aran: life not blamed by others but earning good name (49). When abundant love and aran prevail at home, they are the quality and benefit of family life (45). Promoting purity of heart without any blemish whatsoever is the best way of living; the other so called aran are nothing but empty display (34). However both these terms viz., aram and aran indicate virtue, the former is used to refer to the definition of righteousness, while the former its fulfillment or utlity. However, one can notice the difficulty of the author is not giving a positive meaning or definition of righteousness. The Absence of certain ignorable traits such as anger, jealously etc., is to be understood as aram. 4 In the life of a man his individual life, socio-political life, romantic life are playing a vital life. The first section is pertaining to individual ethics, with the sub-divisions such as domestic virtue, ascetic virtue and fate. The second section is concerned with political ethics which ahs the true meaning, poral of life. It has the headings of royalty, ministers of state and appendix. The third section pertains to conjugal love with the pre-marital love and wedded love as the divisions. The first section ends with the chapter on fate. Man has to llive in accordance to his destiny.